Ling's Report

I have two confessions to make. The first confession is that I do not usually read non-fiction books; I have always been more of a fiction reader, meaning that my picking up The Disaster Artist by Greg Sestero and Tom Bissell is a little out of the ordinary for me. The second confession is that I have not watched Tommy Wiseau’s movie “The Room” in its entirety, though I know and have seen enough to understand the things detailed within the book.   Greg Sestero’s account of his time as one of the key actors of “The Room” and his friendship with the movie director Tommy Wiseau is a fascinating read. While Greg is the narrator and point-of-view character, this book is as much of Tommy’s story as it is Greg’s, shedding some light on a man whose origins remain a mystery even to this day. Each chapter alternates between Greg and Tommy in the early stages of their friendship and the filming of “The Room” itself, transitioning quite seamlessly. The structure of the narrative ...

I have recently been in a phase that I call the “Neil Gaiman Phase.” I will admit that my past knowledge of Neil Gaiman consisted only of the knowledge that he came up with “The Sandman” comics and wrote the book Coraline . However, after stumbling upon a book of his called American Gods , I began looking for more of his works; this resulted in me finding a book I had heard of before but never knew was written by him: Neverwhere . Neverwhere is the story of Richard Mayhew, a relatively ordinary man whose life seems to consist of him being jerked around by his fiancée Jessica. However, that all changes when he runs into a heavily injured girl and decides to help her out. The girl’s name is Door, and it turns out that she comes from another world. However, helping Door ended up having unintended consequences: he seems to have become all but invisible to the people of London, and he also finds himself in Door’s world, known as London Below. As he struggles to get his life back on ...

Deeper is a horror science-fiction novel by Jeff Long and a sequel to The Descent , a dark tale of a group of explorers who discover that a group of humanoids dwell in a large underground kingdom; the humanoids are known as ‘hadals,’ named for their scientific name Homo hadalis , and their culture is one of frightening brutality. The sequel story is kicked off when a group of children suddenly disappear and it seems as though the hadals are responsible. Linguist Ali von Schade, the sole survivor of the previous expedition, finds herself going back to the underground to help find the children. Meanwhile, a mother of one of the missing girls gathers a miniature army to go down and retrieve the children. However, they are ill-equipped to handle the underground world and unprepared for the horrors found there… The strongest part of the story is most definitely the atmosphere and setting. The caverns are a very claustrophobic setting and Long does a good job in showing how the sanity ...

I am the type of person who enjoys books of a psychological nature. The human mind is one of the most familiar yet most mysterious aspects of humanity, capable of surprising us even after we believe we have seen it all. When someone recommended In This Way I was Saved to me by saying that it was a great psychological story, I decided to give it a shot and I was not disappointed. In This Way I was Saved is a book published in 2009, the first ever novel by Brian DeLeeuw. The story is told from the point of view of a boy named Daniel and his friendship and relationship with another boy named Luke. Luke himself is a seemingly normal child, but his personal life is plagued with many problems, particularly his psychologically disturbed mother. Luke’s friendship with Daniel is one of the only things he can enjoy when he needs to take refuge from the harshness of the real world; however, as the two grow older, Luke finds himself depending less and less on Daniel. Daniel doesn’t like th...

Last Days is a 2012 novel by Adam Nevill about a documentary maker named Kyle Freeman. Kyle is contacted by a man named Maximillian Solomon who wants him to make a film about the Temple of the Last Days, a cult run by a woman named Sister Katherine that was thought to have met its end when several members, Sister Katherine included, were found dead from what looked like a gruesome suicide ritual. Kyle, in desperate need of money, takes the job and begins filming, but complications begin to arise in strange sightings and dreams. Soon, Kyle begins to wonder if the Temple of the Last Days has some secrets of a more insidious nature. The atmosphere of the story is well-developed, particularly the cult. While the Temple of the Last Days itself seems to be an amalgamation of several horrific stereotypes associated with cults, the real life existence of such cults such as the one founded by Jim Jones does help in making the Temple not seem too over the top. The atrocities committed by...

The Dark Knight Rises is the final movie in Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight movie trilogy. Nolan has set the bar for himself quite high ever since the second movie, The Dark Knight , gathered critical acclaim; he certainly does not disappoint with the third movie. This movie takes place roughly eight years after the event of The Dark Knight after the Joker’s rampage was put to a stop. Bruce Wayne has become a recluse, having hung up his cowl and still haunted by the death of Rachel Dawes. However, a new threat has come to Gotham, a threat named ‘Bane.’ Bane is a terrifying antagonist, incredibly strong and very cunning as well; Bruce Wayne returns to being Batman to face him, but the past years have not been kind to him and Bane is more than ready to take on the Bat.   This movie was definitely a fun one. Bane was a wonderful villain, a combination of monstrous fighter and criminal mastermind who has a great presence, causing audience members to be on the edge of their...

The Night Circus is a 2011 novel written by Erin Morgenstern. It features a circus known as “Le Cirque de R ê ves, a circus clad in black and white colors that only opens at night. The circus has become the site of a contest between two men: Prospero the Enchanter and Mr. Alexander H---. The two have selected two young illusionists to be their proxies, Prospero choosing his own daughter Celia and Mr. Alexander choosing a young orphan boy named Marco. However, none of the players know the rules of the game or even who their competitor is. This is a book that is very much magical realism, a world where magic and mundane are intimately linked together. Reading through The Night Circus truly does feel like walking through a childhood dream of a carnival of wonders. It is true that the magical elements of the book are never really explained, but that can be excused given the folklore-esque narrative and that such explanations would ruin the whole point of magical realism. The circu...